Tower Petroleum Building vs Medical Dental Building

Comparing the Tower Petroleum Building and the Medical Dental Building is interesting because they both stand in Dallas, TX, and were completed within 2 years of each other, but they were designed by different architects.

This offers a unique glimpse at how rival designers approached projects in the same city during the same era.

The Tower Petroleum Building is clearly the larger tower of the two, both in terms of height and number of floors. It rises to 315ft (96m) with 23 floors above ground, while the Medical Dental Building reaches 105ft (32m) with 8 floors above ground.

Of course, each project may have faced different briefs or regulatory constraints, which we don't really know about and could also explain the outcome.

Both the Tower Petroleum Building and the Medical Dental Building were designed in line with the aesthetic conventions of the Art Deco style.

At the time, this style was at the height of its popularity. So both Mark Lemmon and Arthur J. Rife Construction followed what was in many ways expected of them, producing designs that fit comfortably within contemporary architectural norms, rather than breaking with convention.

The Tower Petroleum Building is primarily hotel, while the Medical Dental Building is primarily commercial.

However, both of them have shifted purpose since their completion. The Tower Petroleum Building evolved from commercial to hotel, while the Medical Dental Building moved from medical to commercial.

The Tower Petroleum Building incorporates a 4-star hotel with 177 rooms. More information is available at the official website.

These two towers illustrate the many possible ways to combine structure and enclosure in skyscraper design.